


Waking Up Dreaming

by Beautiful_Infinity



Series: Antigonish [1]
Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Antigonish Poem, Grillster, M/M, background characters mentioned - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-18
Updated: 2020-07-18
Packaged: 2021-03-04 21:40:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,824
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25353385
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Beautiful_Infinity/pseuds/Beautiful_Infinity
Summary: Grillby can't help but feel as if he's forgotten something important. If only he could remember what it was.
Relationships: W. D. Gaster/Grillby
Series: Antigonish [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1836058
Comments: 3
Kudos: 26





	Waking Up Dreaming

"Yesterday, upon the stair,

I met a man who wasn't there!

He wasn't there again today,

Oh how I wish he'd go away!"

* * *

The rattling of the wind against glass was Grillby’s alarm clock that morning, just as every morning before. It brought the chill of Snowdin with it, settling into the early hours of the morning and permeating each room of his home with its reminder of another cold day. Grillby watched the soft oranges and yellows of his flames playing across his ceiling, slowly stoking themselves back to wakefulness all while his mind tried to grasp at the remnants of a dream he couldn’t quite remember having had. He wasn’t used to dreaming as it was and when he did, it was often full of nightmares and ash and dust. This had left a lingering feeling of nostalgia, comforting and sad. It really was a rare night that he had a dream he wanted to hold onto.

If only he could remember what it was.

The window rattled its reminder that it was time to get up and at ‘em, breaking the last echoes of the dream. A short sigh full of smoke hissed from him and with a groan of displeasure, the fire elemental rolled from his warm bed to face the frigid air of what should be the dawn hours had there been a dawn to see. He could at least recall those much easier than the ghost of his dream. A shudder ran through him, flames flickering with it as his feet touched the cold floor and then he was up and moving finally. He slipped his glasses on, the world shifting into sharper focus along with his sluggish mind. 

Breakfast. Coffee. Dressed. Not in that order.

An hour later saw Grillby dressed to impress, bowtie tied just so, a pot of half finished coffee cooling on the stove in the kitchen and the bartender pulling chairs down from the tables in the bar beneath his loft. It was a practiced sort of tedium that lulled him into a routine, welcome amongst the echo of thoughts that normally tumbled around in unspoken words and half remembered anecdotes otherwise. He pushed the last chair into place, keying the jukebox on to croon a tired melody that he still hadn’t gotten around to replacing. Eventually, he promised himself once more as he reached for the front door lock. 

A shiver traveled down his back, juttering his flames in a sense of deja vu that he couldn’t quite pin down to any one reason.

Why was he unlocking the door now? His first customers, usually the Dog patrols, wouldn’t be by for another hour at the least and normally only for a quick bite and something warm to fill their canteens with before heading off to their posts. Yet something in him was certain that if he opened the door someone would be there on the other side. He had a distinct impression it would be with a wide grin that wasn’t apologetic in any sense of the word for showing up on his doorstep so early, but would be let in with fond exasperation regardless. It felt familiar. A routine. He opened the door.

Nothing.

The little entryway was empty and he frowned, flakes of snow fluttering with the wind to hiss against fiery skin where it would immediately evaporate. Grillby blinked as the feeling of deja vu passed, filled only with the gentle crackle of confused fire and a distinct taste of bitter disappointment in the back of his mouth. He sighed, smoke puffing among a cloud of white condensation into the unsympathetic air of Snowdin. A shake of his head cleared the lingering bite of the disappointment as Grillby grabbed a shovel from the small locker by the door and set about the arduous task of clearing off the front steps that would be a never ending battle throughout the day. That task done, he went back inside to get his kitchen prepped and dishes from breakfast cleaned before customers started to wander in, seeking solace from the permanent chill.

He left the door unlocked.

**__ __ __ __ __**

The wonderful thing about being the only bar in a quiet little town like Snowdin was that slow days only happened once in a long while. Normally only when the weather was too bad to leave home, but that didn’t occur often despite the constant snowfall. It meant that while the mornings were slow and nights short, Grillby was often too busy during the day to dwell on anything that he didn’t want to dwell on. Lingering nightmares became background noise, if not fading out entirely and things that he was too busy to parse as out of place during the day (such as unlocking early) didn’t bother him much. Aside from that strange hiccup, it was business as usual. 

The kitchen was prepped, usual dishes cooking, a fresh pot of coffee warm and ready, and menus left propped against the wall at each booth and in the center of each table. He’d been established long enough that he was fairly confident that he knew all of the little town’s various usual orders, but one never knew when someone traveling from as far as the Capital might make a surprise visit and want something warm in their bellies. He had just finished restocking the bar when the door pushed open, and Lesser Dog ducked his way through the door, signaling the morning arrival of the Dogs.

After the dog patrol had left, and following Dizzy’s entrance, the regulars had started trickling in and the day kicked itself into full gear. He had customers to serve, surfaces to clean, food to cook, drinks to mix, spills to mop up… front porches to shovel off. The last one he did with a resigned flicker of his flame, taking the opportunity to mop up any of the melted snow that got tracked in as well. Bits and pieces of filtered conversations bounced off the walls and left him feeling a little warmer at his core with the easy camaraderie of it all. The quiet murmur of voices was a routine in and of itself, putting him more at ease throughout his working hours than he would ever dare admit. Yet somehow, today just seemed like he couldn’t quite lose himself in the back and forth of voices.

A niggling sense that something was missing still clung to him and more than once he’d found his attention drifting to the door every time it opened, as if waiting for someone to walk in. He supposed that Sans hadn’t made an appearance yet today, though he couldn’t quite place why that wasn’t what he was waiting for. It was vaguely unsettling in a soul deep way, but being this busy meant his thoughts couldn’t focus on it for very long. Which was a good thing considering that the few times they _had_ , he’d strongly considered spending the night with a bottle in his hand and reminiscing about better days gone by. Was it even possible to get drunk with as hot as he could burn when fueled by alcohol? Odd, since drinking himself into a stupor instead of getting at least a few hours of sleep wasn’t a habit of his anyway. He couldn’t remember ever having tried it before.

Whose habit was it and why did it suddenly strike him with the need to hide his best liquor?

“Grilbz, can I get a refill?”

Focus snapping back into place from where he’d begun to daze into the middle distance, Grillby shot a quick ‘be right there’ at Red before he returned to the motions of his job.

**__ __ __ __ __**

Closing time was the time of day that Grillby both looked forward to and dreaded. It was a break between long hours of being on his feet where he could just sit for a few minutes and breathe, but it also left the bar incredibly empty and quiet. Not the quiet of comfortable lulls in conversation or contemplative silences either, but the kind that permeated the corners with shadows and half-promises of nightmares should he linger in the depths of his thoughts too long. With a groan, Grillby leaned against the freshly cleaned counter and rubbed at a shoulder to ease away the strain of the day. It used to be that he could stand for hours and nothing would come of it other than the irritation of having been in one place for too long. Nowadays he felt the stiffness of magic that settled in his shoulders and back. It’s what he got for settling somewhere so cold, he supposed. 

‘ _Or maybe_ ,’ A voice in the back of his head teased, ‘ _You’re just getting old_.’

Grillby snorted with a pop-fizz and took in the bar, considering if he had missed anything in his cleanup that couldn’t be put off until the next morning and drew a blank. Dishes washed and put away? Check. Tables cleaned and chairs propped up? Check. Floors mopped? Check. Grill cleaned? Check. Gold accounted for and tips set aside to send to Sizzlyn to help pay for school expenses? Triple check. Everything seemed to be in order, his own need for cleanliness making sure of a thorough routine. Even so... he didn’t really want to retreat upstairs to his empty loft to lie awake for hours until exhaustion finally claimed him. Perhaps he could count stock before bed. One could never be too prepared when resources were finite. With a determination to get the tedious work out of the way so he didn’t have to do it tomorrow, he pushed off the counter with a tall stretch and turned to the kitchen.

_“You work too hard, Starshine.”_

A grin pulled at the mouth under his flames.

“Like you’re one to talk-” The words faltered on his lips as he turned around to find nothing but the dimness of his bar and flickering shadows from his flames playing against the walls and furniture. A shudder tripped it’s way down his back for the second time that day. There had been someone behind him, hadn’t there? They’d whispered the resigned reprimand with such clarity that he could still hear the words if not the voice. The grin that had been forming pulled into a hard frown as the feeling faded. Grillby shook his head. Maybe he _had_ been working too hard if he was hearing voices. Stock could wait for another day. He needed to at least try to sleep. If only to rid himself of the strange feelings of incompleteness that clung to his clothes like the smell of grease from his fryers.

Without another word or thought to the shadows in his bar, Grillby shut off the rest of the lights and retreated back to his loft, leaving the floor dark with the heaviness of memories.

**Author's Note:**

> So this lovely idea for this series was inspired by the poem Antigonish by William Hughes Mearns and influenced by reports of the ghost of a man roaming the stairs of a haunted house, in Antigonish, Nova Scotia, Canada. It had been sitting around in my head for a good while and then an ask I had made anonymously on Tumblr yielded some pretty awesome art by the amazing [Silverskye13](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Silverskye13/pseuds/Silverskye13). If you haven't read their Undertale fics yet, I absolutely encourage it! I've been in this fandom so long and I can't believe it's taken me this long to make any content for it. Big Shout Out to the brilliant [Thaylepo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thaylepo) who is responsible for one of my favorite Undertale Fics "On the Rocks" for being an awesome editor and voice of reason in my deliberations and writings. This is only installment one of five planned and was meant to kick off the series, so I apologize for the lack of dialogue and interactions. See y'all in the next installment!


End file.
